Wednesday 12 March 2014

Mini - Micro tomatoes

Another passion - miniature tomato plants. I guess more of a novelty to many but I love them because they are small enough to grow in pots on a windowsill, in small tubs and hanging baskets. They are easily managed making them great for growing indoors provided they get enough light. And a big bonus during the winter months, they feed my passion when not much else is happening.

Green When Ripe fruits


I'm playing around with developing several varieties, I'm looking for different traits to add interest. I don't think these little beauties are going to rival Brandywine for taste just at the moment, but who knows what is just around the corner!

The mini tomatoes I'm breeding are all in the process of becoming stable varieties. Some are quite new crosses and still very unstable, they will be recombining their genes for colour, height, leaf shape and taste etc. Others are well on the way to being a stable variety like Micro Blue, which now only has small and subtle differences between plants.

Micro Blue, very small growing plant, producing red fruit with anthocyanin (antho) colouring the skin that has been exposed to sunlight. Very slight antho expressed on the leaves in young plants, stems are also seen to be 'blue'

Micro Blue seedling

Mini Splash an F3 seedling is looking promising to become a windowsill type plant. The parent dwarf plant grew to approx two foot, had very little variegation and produced brown/black fruit with thick walls. Tomatoes were sweet and juicy with a good tomato taste.

Mini Splash

Side view of very compact growth

I just spotted this little fellow amongst a group of home-bred F4 siblings.


Looks to be partly woolly, small growing and with blue antho. A possible mini Blue Mammoth in the making? The tomatoes from the parent plant were quite striking.



However you describe these tomatoes, one thing is for sure - I think they are gorgeous!


4 comments:

  1. Wow! You have done very well creating these. I have only recently crossed a woolly tomato with Micro Tom in the hope of creating a woolly micro tomato and if my results are anything like yours they will be very cute plants indeed.

    How did the Mini Splash work out? The picture looks amazing, I would love to grow one of those.

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    1. Thanks, I love the little woollies, so cute! Good luck with your mini woollies I'm really looking forward to your progress, it will be great to see your selections.

      The taste on some of the woolly lines I have is good which is great, they look so ornamental you son't expect them to have a decent tomato kick.

      Mini-splash, I've several variegated lines in progress, some of the black fruited and yellow ones are my favourites so far. I'd really like a GWR to grow too. I've started several lines to grow this summer, I just need to find space for them all! I should have seeds in a few months.

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    2. Could i please buy some Mini Splash seeds.....

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  2. Could i buy some Black Mini Splash seeds please?

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